This is a place to get information on Protest Petitions in the State of North Carolina and how back in 1971 the City of Greensboro exempted themselves from this North Carolina General Statute. This blog is here to inform and did make the city of Greensboro be like every other city in this state and have a Protest Petition avaliable to their citizens in the zoning process,by passing a State Law in House Bill #64 during long session of 2009 on 3-5-2009.

Jan 19, 2009

This is a new online news organization called The Greensboro Telegram CLICKHERE . Randall Gregg interviewed Keith Brown for a article called

"Greensboro Zoning Petition Group To Seek NC Help",

here is a few paragraphs from the article and if you want to see the whole article CLICKHERE or click on the title above.

"The protest petition is designed to allow neighborhoods and neighboring landowners to have more input in development, said Brown.

As an example, Brown said that in High Point -- where the protest petition is still in use -- a recent rezoning for a development that included an apartment complex and restaurants near the Wendover Avenue and Highway 68 intersection was opposed by neighbors. They signed the protest petition and the developer's proposal was defeated at the High Point City Council level, as it did not get the "supermajority" needed.

According to Brown, the developer came back and worked with neighboring residents to address some of the issues they were concerned about, such as increased setbacks from neighboring properties, eliminating drive-throughs in the proposed restaurants, and reducing the ability of apartment dwellers to peer into neighbors' back yards."We hashed out a lot of problems," said Brown.

After the conditional requirements were agreed upon and placed on the development, the neighbors withdrew their protest petition and the rezoning was approved, said Brown."

As you can see from the above in the article our neighborhood in High Point called Sutton Place had a rezoning case where we had the right to use the Protest Petitions. It was a very long process but after it was said and done the developer got their apartment complex and our neighborhood got our conditions put on the property. It was a win win scenario. If this would have been in Greensboro with no rights to use Protest Petition then you would have seen a different outcome and the neighborhoods going to the table with one hand tied behind their back this being no right to use the Protest Petition.

It is not fair to the citizens of Greensboro that they don't have the right to use Protest Petition and I urge everyone to talk to your Greensboro City Council members and let them know you want the same rights as every other citizen who lives in a city has.